Goodbye Lyric

"This versatile poet blinks at nothing under the stars."—Al Young

"I don t know that I've read poems that do longing as beautifully, as bountifully and crushingly as Goodbye Lyric. At nearly every turn we are faced with a speaker who is sorrowfully ravenous for the world, for that which has changed or disappeared. I don't know exactly how to describe that longing in the context of Kocher's language, which is lush and precise and like a galaxy swirling in the mouth. It makes something happen in my body unlike almost anything I've ever read. It makes me want to touch everything."—Ross Gay

"Kocher is one of the most versatile poets writing today. As readers of her fifth collection, Goodbye Lyric, will discover, Kocher has the rare ability to re-conceptualize line and form from book to book, while still maintaining her distinct voice and ever-present allegiance to duende. These gorgeous and delicately-balanced lyrics many of which are written in a form Kocher herself created, the gigan show us once again the breadth of Kocher's imagination, the capaciousness of her always-surprising language."—Adrian Matejka, author of The Big Smoke: Mixology, and The Devil's Garden